Everyone else seems to reply to this question with the Muppets version. Now, I like the Muppets version and admire its cleverness, but my favourite Christmas Carol adaption is actually not any of the film versions, but the audio recording of Patrick Stewart's stage performance. Not, I emphasize, the made for tv 1999 adaption where Stewart plays Scrooge; no, I mean the stage solo version he did for the RSC in 1993, and for which he won an Olivier. Alas I did not have the chance to see it on stage, but a kind soul gave me the tape - this was when tapes were still a thing - and I loved it. The key difference here is that Patrick Stewart doesn't just play Scrooge, he recites Dickens' prose - a very different thing - and the way he brings those lines to life, the versatility of it, is nothing short of amazing. To quote from this review : You notice at once that there aren’t many actors left like Stewart these days, actors who can speak with such exemplary power and clarity. When he declares: “Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! A squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner”, every word, every syllable, is made to count. He relishes all the glorious energy, flavour and humour of Dickens’s prose, and Scrooge suddenly seems to stand before us in all his grotesque glory. (...) In the course of the show, Stewart plays some 40 characters, ranging from the falsetto innocence of Tiny Tim to the disgusting squalor of Old Joe, the greasy rag-and-bone man in his filthy lair. Has the ghost of Marley ever seemed more pitifully sad, the joy of the Cratchits’ Christmas celebrations more touchingly merry? I beg leave to doubt it.

Stewart also proves a virtuoso when it comes to pace and mood. There are rapt passages here when the whole audience seems to be holding its breath as Stewart lays bare the darkness of Scrooge’s soul and the terrible urgency of turning it to the light. But then he will suddenly relax into humour and vitality, picking up the narrative thread, barreling through the action and imitating the chimes of the bells (“Ga-doing, Ga-doing”) with almost childlike enthusiasm.

And that's why even the mere audio recording is my favourite adaption of A Christmas Carol.

The other days

Ask, and ye shall be given. I did, and artaxastra wrote lovely, lovely Gandalf/Galadriel fanfiction:

By the Falls of Imladris


Meanwhile, Time Magazine did a little story on Ian McKellen and Patrick Stewart (currently busy promoting their two Broadway plays), and they demonstrate again why no one needs to write RPF for these two, because what could match dialogue like this:

'The first time I saw Ian, he was playing Claudio in Much Ado About Nothing," Stewart remembers. 'Good lord," says McKellen - that was in 1965, and he was a relatively small fry in the stellar Franco Zeffirelli production.
"I was instantly envious of his extraordinary good looks, not to say beauty," says Stewart. "He had a glamour about him."
McKellen: "You sure it wasn't Derek Jacobi?"

You know, many an actor doesn't, independent on how good or bad they are in their chosen craft, provide very interesting interviews. They do them because it's their duty when promoting the latest film/tv show/theatre project they're involved in, but the result often reads no more interesting than the latest PR release from whatever production company is responsible for the film/tv show/theatre project in question. And I have sympathy for that, because providing interesting conversation with total strangers isn't easy, and that's assuming the interviewers aren't the obnoxious type who poke for intimate details. But still: I'm extra thrilled when coming across genuinenly interesting interviews. Which quite often happens when Patrick Stewart is involved.

Here is a recent great example, by the LA Times and apropos the latest TNG anniversary. What's expecially endearing to me is his geeking out about Hollywood history and identifying the Paramount office where specific Sunset Boulevard scenes were shot at as still in use when they were shooting Next Gen at Paramount. (And his making off with the office letters.) But really, it's just an all around enjoyable interview to read. Also, his joke about the next X-Men film being just Magneto and Xavier talking cracks me up, not least because I know a couple of fans including yours truly who'd so be there for that. :)

***

My latest wave of Jossverse nostalgia trigged by meta and fanfiction alike, to wit:

BTVS:

Buffy and Faith in Bad Girls/Consequences. Meta which manages to be fair to both girls. (Much rarer than you'd think. I remember reading, at the time, a certain BNF's pronouncement that Buffy was behaving "like Stalin", which meant I could never take anything she wrote seriously again.)

AtS:

as one mourneth for an only son: fantastic Connor fanfiction, covering all his stages from Steven to Connor to new memories!Connor Reilly to Rembering!Connor. Connor and Darla: still my favourites. And it's much rarer to find someone writing the former well than the later.

I.) Last night I was at the opera. This year, the Munich opera did the entire Ring and last night they showed the final part, the Götterdämmerung. Unfortunately, after the three previous productions were all well sung and imaginatively staged (the first production in which bringing masses of people who aren't in the script on stage actually worked for me, because said people formed the forest, the Rhine, etc, in a great use of body colour and performance art), for the last part the director abandoned his psychological/painting-by-bodies approach in favour of neorealism plus topical allusion. Suddenly it was about the Euro crisis and the one of the essays in the program (translated from the English language, by an American) earnestly informed us that Angela Merkel is Wotan (who doesn't even show up in Götterdämmerung), Francois Hollande is Brünnhilde and Alexis What's his name from Greece is Siegfried. And then there was Gutrune riding on a symbol for the Euro. Um. The singing was still great, but any attempt to imagine Francois Hollande as a former Valkyrie or vice versa was met with swift and abject failure. (If, gentle reader, you have no idea what the Ring of the Nibelung is all about, fear not: here is the fifteen minutes version, written by yours truly.) Also, nobody deserves being compared to the most obnoxious opera hero ever. (Why no, I can't stand Siegfried.)


II.) The first past of The Hollow Crown, Richard II, was broadcast, and reviewed by the Guardian thusly: Ben Whishaw, last seen being ambitious and lairy in The Hour, reprised both talents as Richard II but also managed somehow to trample wonderfully over himself and the kingdom with a masterclass in passive-aggressive venality and foot-shootery. Whishaw and Rory Kinnear as Bolingbroke mesmerised, and it was a rare delight to see David Suchet, as York, tear himself free ("ouchayowsa!") from Poirot's moustache and be allowed to act, but the best scenes were saved for super-thesp Patrick Stewart as John of Gaunt.

Not my favourite man in real life, due to a certain innate… bumptiousness… but not the point. He's an actor, and does so honestly and terribly well. His speech before his son's banishment from England, to "look what thy soul holds dear" and "imagine it/ To lie the way thou go'st, not the way thou comest", and "Suppose the singing birds musicians… The flowers fair ladies…" was essentially the shortest, pithiest and best self-help book ever.

Stewart-as-Gaunt's dying valediction to England – the "sceptr'd isle" stuff – and the "this happy breed" stuff was not only backshiveringly good but, listened to in full, suddenly struck me as the perfect opening speech for the Olympic thing, with its sheep and village greens, to encapsulate a land's history. The blip, of course, comes in the savage, resentful ending, Gaunt despising nephew Richard's greed. "This land… is now leased out, I die pronouncing it,/ Like to a tenement or pelting farm./ England… is now bound in with shame." So Shakespeare also foresaw Visa and McDonald's.

Go on, Danny Boyle, we dare you. The skypes are calling. We'd love you so.

III.) Every now and then (read: when I'm breaking that rule), I'm reminded why I stick to the few fellow Merlin fans on my flist and stay away from the fandom at large. You have the two extremes between the fanatic Arthur/Merlin OTP crowd who curses Gwen (and her breasts) for existing and the Gwen fans who think the show doesn't have anything worthwile to watch but Gwen and everyone else is horrible (and/or horribly written). And here I am, waving my OT3 flag, and being fond of Gwen, Arthur and Merlin together and in any combination. I'd love more screentime for Gwen, absolutely, but I also loved s4 best of all the seasons. (While considering it flawed, like all the seasons. But I just don't get the "only s1 was good" thing.) And then there's the "everyone agrees that..." Every time I read this, I want to raise a hand in protest because how would the poster know "everyone" agrees? I usually don't, and not just in Merlin. So, my rules for staying sane instead of spending my days in frustration is:

1.) Stay away from any fic which has a variation of "Arthur realises Merlin, not Gwen is the one he really loves" in the summary. Arthur loves them both.

2.) Stay away from any fic that has a variation of "Merlin can't stand it anymore" in the summary. Merlin loves Gwen and ships Arthur/Gwen madly.

3.) Stay away from any fic that looks like it's skipping over what Morgana did to Gwen in s4 in order to get them together. This is especially frustrating because I'd love to read encounters between Morgana and Gwen post season 4 and am on the lookout for those, but ignoring mindmessing and consent issues isn't any less icky if it's a female character responsible.

4.) Stay away from any post that pulls faux feminist arguments like "my problem with Gwen isn't that she's the female love interest of one half of my slash pairing but that she's written without agenda; I liked her in season 1, totes!" (you know, when she wasn't together with one half of the slash pairing) "and she had so much more initiative there" (um; I love s1 Gwen, but s1 Gwen would not have challenged Arthur on standing by and allowing a good man to die (again) as she does in s2's The Witch Finder, wouldn't have responded with that quiet, devastating put down to Uther as she does in s3 (and we have a direct basis of comparison to s1 when it comes to Gwen being dragged in front of Uther and accused of magic, wouldn't have challenged Agrivaine in the councel on behalf of the citzens of Camelot as she does in s4). Maybe I'm wronging some people, but every time I've read something like that it came across as a flimsy pretext.

Patrick Stewart, getting interviewed about a recent Macbeth performance, talks about Ian McKellen giving him tips on the Tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow monologue:





And lo and behold, YouTube also has the monologue in question (which is Macbeth's response to the news his wife has died) performed by both actors, in a completley different fashion (and both variations are superb):

Patrick Stewart as Macbeth

Ian McKellen as Macbeth

In conclusion, Gandalf/Picard OTP Magneto/Xavier Forever British septuangarian actors are awesome. And always were. (That McKellen clip is from the Trevor Nunn production in the 70s, with Judi Dench as Lady MacBeth, the only production I've seen where both Macbeth and Lady M were played by actors of equal strength. Normally one or the other is weaker.)

1.) Patrick Stewart guest stars in season 4 of New Who. Err, I think there were rumours about him being Davros or something like that a few years back? Anyway. I wish. Not necessarily Davros (though any Patrick S. would have been fine!), but oh, I wish. (Especially since I've seen him and David Tennant together on stage.) (I'll never stop boasting about this.)

2.) JMS (that's Joe Straczynski to you, non-Babylon 5 people) does a remake of Blake's 7. Because he's the only one of the current crop I'd trust do one that gets core elements of the original and comes up with a spin of its own. Mind you, there would also be the usual JMS weaknesses (watch out for characters with the initials J.S.! Operatic speech! Someone at some point quotes the "never start a fight, but always finish it!" staying!), but it could be really really interesting. I tend to be sceptical of remakes/reboots, but now and then they surprise you in a good way. This one would have great potential. Alas, I don't think it was ever more than wishful thinking.

3.) Elves get it on more than once a millennium, or whatever the Tolkien-approved time span was. Not that I'd go to the opposite end of the spectrum as much fanfiction does, but come on. No species deserves that little of a sex life.

4.) The Double Quickening at the end of the Comes a Horseman/Revelation two parter in Highlander has left Duncan and Methos with the ability to recognize each other beyond the general Immortal buzz. This was a popular fanon I was fond of back in my HL days and shamelessly used myself in fanfiction, despite the fact it's actually disproven by the show (in Forgive us our Trespasses, Duncan at one point feels an Immortal approaching and assumes it's Keane until he sees Methos).

5.) Various members of the Beatles have the ability to time-travel. At least judging by the sheer number of stories that let them do this, usually, but not always, to prevent John's death, it seems to be a popular conviction. Well, they did appear on Doctor Who once...

On an awwwww note about them both, Patrick Stewart about David Tennant:



Here's hoping theatre (and tv, and cinema) producers listen. * ♥ them both in embarrassingly fangirlish fashion*


Also, another gem from the recent Vid Con:

Doctor Who: Take On Me: all the regenerations, all the companions. I so love vids that celebrate DW as a whole, Old and New Who alike (and manage to make the footage from so many different eras flow seamlessly into each other).

1.) The Multiverse ficathon (aka multiverse5000; this year's run has just started). Ever since andraste and iamsab came up with the idea in 2004, it had resulted in great crossovers between my favourite sci-fi shows for me to read, and as a writer, it has challenged me and has resulted in some of the stories I'm proudest of.

2.) Yuletide. On a similar note, this ficathon which for years I'd been too chicken to participate in until I finally took the proverbial plunge last year provides not only great stories at the end of each year but, even more importantly, stories in fandoms that aren't popular (at least not on the internet), which means otherwise it's really hard to find something written in them. If you've ever fallen in love with a movie/show/book and were frustrated not many other people seemed to, or at least not enough to get creative about it, you know what a blessing the Yuletide ficathon is.

3.) All the new blood in Star Trek fandom following ST XI last year. Yes, some of the new kids on the block do that annoying thing where they scorn the rest of the Trekverse, and don't get me started on media stupidity like SFX' ravings about how finally some manliness was back in Star Trek, but still. A lot of newbies got and get inspired to discover Star Trek in its many incarnations Even those who stick to strictly TOS/new movie territory bring their own ideas and creativity to the fandom, and instead of new stories being written every six or seven months or only once a year, we have daily newsletters again. (And if one of the new fans is James Franco, he even slashes Kirk/Spock to general media applause. What's next, Zachary Quinto publishing his Peter/Harry stories?) To quote never-my-captain James. T. Kirk at the end of Star Trek: Wrath of Khan: "I feel young."

4.) Watching Greg Doran's production of Hamlet live on stage with bimo on July 31st in 2008. This managed to make me happy in three different fandoms at the same time, since it starred both David Tennant and Patrick Stewart and was superb Shakespeare. Also, as opposed to media reports, there was no ill behaviour by fans (i.e. everyone in the audience reacted to stage events, there were no shoutings to the actors or something like that, let alone interruptions of performances, which made me happy as a fan as well. (Btw, I also was able to attend the play Catherine Tate was in at the same time in London that year, and wouldn't you know it, the media wrote that when David Tennant and Georgia Moffet attended, the audience interrupted hte performances so they had to leave during the break, which would have been quite an effort considering that it was a one-act play without a break - I really don't know where the media obsession to paint sci fi fans as rude nutters comes from!) It will always remain one of my fondest theatre memories.

5.) The Blake's 7/Babylon 5 Redemption convention I attended years ago where the cunning watervole, filker extraordinaire, was so inspiring that I didn't just join the chorus of people singing the Andromedan battle hymn but filked the Ode to Joy for B7, and I met several fellow fen whom I still "see" online on a regular basis. Also, the "was Blake right or wrong about Star One?" debate was fun as always, Gareth Thomas was very nice to everyone, and I first discovered the phenomenon that American fans take the elevator whereas European fans take the stairs if there are two panels shortly after another on two different floors. Lastly, Londo Mollari won the ruler of the universe competition; in short, it was the perfect con.

Do you want to know in which context Ian McKellen said "After six months with Patrick in the dressing room I really thought I could live with him" and Patrick Stewart taught Roger Rees the correct pronounciation of "Magneto"? Of course you do.

Also, I'm always envious of people who can do mixtapes/famixes/whatever you want to call them for characters and shows. Back in my roleplaying days, one of the writing challenges asked us to let the characters do this for themselves, and the character I was then writing was Arvin Sloane. That threw me into a complete loop, until I realized Sloane, being a smart and dignified evil overlord, would simply delegate the task to Marshall, which is how I wrote the prompt. (But still had trouble coming up with songs, though it was easier from Marshall's pov.) Now, someone who apparantly has no trouble at all with these prompts is nicole_anell, who posted a funny and sad mixtape as created by Felix Gaeta about Gaius Baltar. Read, enjoy and listen here.

1.) Trailer for the Tennant/Stewart Hamlet , which both brings back the joy of having watched this live and the anticipation of seeing it again. I just hope the RSC delivered that dvd I ordered eons ago as promised. Also, once the dvd is available and the film has been broadcast, I hope for lots of screencaps and plenty of icons, hopefully some of which will show both actors I tend to fangirl in the same shot. (The publicity photos by the RSC last year just weren't what I wanted in this department.)

2.) Yuletide Uploading is open. Uploading my story reminded me again what fun it was to write. I've always looked forward to the 25th because Yuletide is such a great ficathon, but this year there is that additional slight nervousness which comes with having made a contribution as well. Let's see how rare that rare fandom is...

3.) Discovered via vilakins: Pride & Prejudice via Emoticons. Who cares about adaptions with zombies if you can have adaptions via emoticons! :)

4.) Methinks Warren Ellis really hit his stride with his second arc in Astonishing X-Men. #33 is out, that's the third issue in a row which is fun to read, doesn't have wth? character moments and came without any long interruptions in between. If you really want to nitpick, you can argue Storm's role in the Ellis line-up is, the one discussion she had with Cyclops in the last arc aside, somewhat bland, especially compared with Kitty in the Whedon line-up, but that's really not much of an issue. I'm so happy Hisako continues to play a major role in AXM, and Ellis writes her absolutely delightful. He also seems to want Scott/Logan 'shippers really happy with this second arc, seeing as he continues to write their interaction. Also, the art for the second arc is way better than for the first, especially for my beloved Abigail Brand and for Hank McCoy. Speaking of my favourite morally ambigous agent, ( I continue to harbor a spoilery suspicion. )

5.) Five Minutes, Mr. Welles. I had heard about this short film (31 minutes) which premiered at the Venice Film Festival 2004, starring and directed by Vincent D'Onofrio, but I had no idea it was available on YouTube until yesterday. D'Onofrio had played Orson Welles before, as a cameo in Tim Burton's Ed Wood, but this time he gets to use his own voice. Which doesn't sound at all like Welles', but that's beside the point here. (Especially since he's great with the body language and the script.) This particular short film is set during the shooting of The Third Man, at a time when Orson Welles had long since stopped being a beloved prodigy and was now in quasi-exile from Hollywood, mostly living in Europe and hiring himself out as an actor to finance his own movies. Quite often, this meant a lot of mediocre films to play in, but occasionally, he lucked out in his quest for movie-financing cash and got a role in a great picture. But you don't even have to know that in order to enjoy this half an hour which among other things showcases some magic of acting, as D'Onofrio-as-Welles goes from memorizing the Ferris Wheel scene in a listless, lifeless manner to injecting a flicker of personality in the lines to finally, at the end, coming up with a complete performance of Harry Lime, complete with the ad-lib Welles contributed to Graham Greene's script. The second character is an invented one, but in complete contradiction to my nagging about the book Me and Orson Welles I shall praise her existence. Katherine, scriptgirl-plus-personal-assistant, played by the classy Janine Theriault whom I've never seen before but now shall look out for, goes from seemingly powerless to actually powerful, and goes the through the full O.W. experience of alternatingly being frustrated, angry, challenged and charmed. There are some lovely visual homages to Welles as a director (the camera angles are obvious, but I clued in the Othello bit one only after I'd seen it; well-done, especially since Othello was the film Welles was needing the cash for). And in case you've never ever seen The Third Man - and what stopped you so far? - this is the scene Welles is rehearsing in Five Minutes, Mr. Welles. One of the all time classics and endlessly quotable. (And imitated and quoted from about a million times.)